My Favourite Thriller Films- The Impossible

• 'The Impossible' is one of my favourite thriller films due to many reasons. I love the way that it is a true story and this makes you see the film from a different perspective because you are shocked that real people have gone through it. The way that the story is put together is very clever because you get completely engrossed in the story and I genuinely cried at the end!  
• The film is based on a real families experience in the 2004 Tsunami in Thailand.
• English physician Maria Bennet (Naomi Watts), her Scottish husband Henry (Ewan McGregor) and their sons Lucas (Tom Holland),
  
  Thomas (Samuel Joslin), and Simon (Oakley Pendergrast) are on a Christmas holiday in Khao Lak,Thailand, in 2004. The tsunami triggered by the Indian Ocean earthquake floods the area with overwhelming destructive power.
• Maria and Lucas are swept away from the others and barely survive; Maria is severely injured, and they find a toddler named Daniel in the wreckage who, despite Lucas' reluctance, Maria insists taking along. They are found by locals, who transfer them to a local hospital where Maria encourages Lucas to occupy himself by assisting in any way he can, which leads to his searching for strangers on behalf of relatives looking for them at the facility. 
• Due to a mix-up, the hospital staff believe Maria, who has been moved from her bed, has died and take Lucas to a tent where
  
  children without families are being held. Maria has surgery on her injured chest and is mistakenly labeled as "Muriel Barnes". She is eventually reunited with Lucas but remains in a highly fragile medical state waiting to be deemed fit for further surgery on her leg wound, which is deteriorating. While waiting outside the ward, Lucas sees Daniel reuniting with his father.
• Elsewhere, Henry, Thomas and Simon have survived the tsunami together, although Henry is injured. He places the children in a vehicle supposed to take tourists to a safe place while he remains behind to search for Maria and Lucas. Further injured while failing to find them, he arrives at the evacuation point only to discover that Thomas and Simon have been sent elsewhere. Communication facilities are scarce but a tourist named Karl, who was also separated from his family, lends Henry his cell phone to contact his relatives, and volunteers to accompany Henry to look for Maria and Lucas.
• They search for their families in various places before they arrive at the hospital where Maria and Lucas are. The vehicle carrying Thomas and Simon stops outside the hospital; the family eventually reunites. Maria has surgery, which she survives, and the following day the family boards an ambulance airplane to Singapore arranged by their insurance company for further treatment for Maria.
• I really like the way that Naomi Watts portrays her character in this film because you can really tell that Maria is concerned for her sons above herself, even though it is her that is in real pain, she tries not to let it show for the sake of her sons. I think that maybe the fact that she has sons of her own may have helped her develop her character because she would almost certainly respond in the same way if she was in her characters position. 
• The film came out in 2012 and was directed by Juan Antonio Bayona.
• It was produced by Álvaro Augustin, Belen Atienza and Enrique López Lavigne
• It was written by Sergio G. Sánchez. 
• The family on which this story is based upon were present during the whole shooting process. They were giving tips, especially 'Maria Belon' who is portrayed by Naomi Watts. The whole family also attended the film's premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in 2012.
• I visited Thailand two years after the Tsunami and I witnessed first hand some of the damage that was done, so when I saw this film it brought back all those memories and I just couldn't help thinking how lucky I was that we didn't go that year.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Impossible_(2012_film)#Plot

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1649419/trivia

^The impossible Featurette